Sunday Word: Virago
virago [vi-rah-goh, -rey-]
noun:
1 a loud-voiced, ill-tempered, scolding woman; shrew
2 (archaic) a woman of great stature, strength, and courage
Also the trade name of celebrated feminist publishing firm, Virago Press.
Examples:
She was lovely, well-dressed, filled with promise. But she was also demanding and manipulative, a virago when she didn’t get her way. (Marie Arana, Book review: Richard Russo's memoir, 'Elsewhere', The Sunday Times, November 2012)
At the centre of this swirl of #MeToo crimes and misdemeanours is Maxine Peake's Sam, a hard-faced virago who joined the company when she was 16 and worked her way up to be chief operating officer, the only woman at management meetings and praised by the brothers - who are of an age to have tumbled with her in the playground - as 'one of the boys'. (Stephanie Bunbury, Maxine Peake is the virago at the centre of a thorny MeToo drama, The Sydney Morning Herald, April 2022)
For one instant the appealing little woman looked for all the world like the household variety of virago who's sweet as all get out as long as guests are present and ready to snatch the family bald-headed as soon as the door is closed. (Leslie Ford, The Devil's Stronghold)
If the messenger whom he had seen were really Catherine Seyton, what a masculine virago and termagant must she be! (Sir Walter Scott, The Abbot)
But it may have touched him that at that moment he was less than his companion and his virago wife. (Bret Harte, Stories in Light and Shadow)
Origin:
late 14c, 'man-like or heroic woman, woman of extraordinary stature, strength and courage,' from Latin virago 'female warrior, heroine, amazon,' from vir 'man' (from PIE root wi-ro- 'man'). Ælfric (c 1000), following Vulgate, used it in Genesis ii 23 as the name Adam gave to Eve (Online Etymology Dictionaty)
The original Latin meaning of virago was 'female warrior'. But in later centuries the meaning shifted toward the negative. The most famous virago in English literature is the ferocious Kate in Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. Some historical viragoes have also become famous. Agrippina poisoned her husband, the Emperor Claudius, so that her son Nero could take his place (but it was Nero himself who eventually had her assassinated). And Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, a powerful virago of the 12th century, was imprisoned by her husband, King Henry II of England, after she encouraged their sons to rebel against him. Today some people are beginning to use virago admiringly again. (Merriam Webster)